Loveless by My Bloody Valentine

Drawing Beauty From The Static

A noisy, weathered wall-of-sound that throws together the gentle and beautiful with the rough and raucous. Released in 1991 after two difficult years of recording, Loveless seemed to travel sonically to new worlds other artists hardly dreamed of, and the influence of that sound rippled throughout the rest of the '90s to today. Though praised universally, My Bloody Valentine slowly fell apart; Kevin Shields, Colm Ó Cíosóig, Debbie Googe, and Belinda Butcher never fully profited from their masterpiece. They officially disbanded in 1997, without releasing a follow-up. It took 22 years for My Bloody Valentine to reunite and release the excellent m b v.

Loveless has the rare quality of being universally lauded then and still revered now. My Bloody Valentine painstakingly crafted a sound nearly twisted enough to be terrifying while simultaneously transcendent enough to be euphoric: powerful in that tension. Kevin Shields directed the recording process, and his guitars built the bulk of the otherworldly noises that so many others have since borrowed. Once you have an ear for it, it's easy to recognize the real thing.